


nowhere to go but on

by remnantof



Category: Natsume Yuujinchou
Genre: Gen, Holding Hands, M/M, POV Second Person, Touching, understated
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-03-16
Updated: 2012-03-16
Packaged: 2017-11-02 00:56:36
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 760
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/363241
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/remnantof/pseuds/remnantof
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>No one pushes you.  They're always so patient.</p>
            </blockquote>





	nowhere to go but on

Your hands meet at the plate, you stop breathing. He doesn’t pull away, so you have to, you have to: his smallest finger hooks your own, pulls it closer, opens the gap to link the ring, the middle, the index. It’s like a game, something his father taught him to ward off spirits. Does he also hang his pictures in the closet, but upside down? What disaster would you fear, in righting them?

You have to.

He smiles, picks up a slice of the melon. Thanks you, again, for the treat. He tells you how different it is to receive one from you, from your family. To eat it outside of a hospital bed. Something in you responds, reaches into and back out of the ache: you didn’t eat them very often either. You didn’t eat them with a friend. No one touched you so deliberately, or was so easy, so calmly pulled away from. There were only extremes, a wall that kept you just outside of the family or your own wall being breached. Couples without their own children, who hated the way you slumped and sulked, shrunk away from their hands. You were a terrible child, denying them that happiness, not being what they wanted to complete their family. 

Touko is easy too. She fusses, until your skin feels hot and tight, until your throat starts to hurt, then realises herself, pats her own cheek to spare yours, gets you something to drink with an absent laugh. You think you should hug her, though you’re much too old for it now. You think she would like it.

You grabbed her sleeve once. She had started to laugh, to let you go when she’d spent too long trying to fix your hair, and you didn’t want it that time. You wanted her to stay right there, offering to cut it after school. To never grow any older, to never leave the house again, to never stop smiling--smiling at _you_.

That’s why you hated it, right? When people smile at you, they can stop, too. It was better if they never did. She was so happy, just to see your hand on her sleeve, just to see you want that much.

No one pushes you. They’re always so patient.

Your breathe drags. His back twists against yours, melon placed back on the plate. Your fingers still feel cool, a little sticky, where his rested between them. “Natsume,” he asks, moving to see beyond the shell of your ear, the curtain of your hair. You should really let her cut it: she would like that too. Or Taki, or Kitamoto: you think he would be happiest of the three. 

Tanuma doesn’t think about things like that. He doesn’t care how your hair looks, only that you’re trying to hide behind it, only that you’re crying. “I’m sorry--” You shouldn’t have thought about it, you should have just--let him hold your hand. Let the people who wanted--still want you--let them have you. “Was it this,” he asks, hedged with a whine of puzzlement, exasperation, as he takes your fingers again. “Did you think I wouldn’t give it back,” he asks, and you realize he’s teasing you, but really isn’t, when he drapes his other arm over your back, kisses the palm before letting go.

“I had trouble with it too, you know. When I was sick, really sick--no one wants to get too close, no one touches you. My father would be away on business, I missed too much school to have those kinds of friends. It was just the doctors and nurses, getting me in and out of bed, running tests. It’s very impersonal, and the gloves kind of smell.” He smiles, wanting you to smile back, but just squeezes your shoulders when you don’t. “It’s kind of weird here, with people like Nishimura. But it’s good too, isn’t it?”

Touko’s fussing. Natori patting your hair. Nishimura grabbing you from his desk; Taki taking your wrist, to hold you back and ask if you’re alright. Tanuma reaching, stopping, connecting, releasing. Everything you want is right here, waiting for you to take it. “Yeah, it is.”

You sniff, suck it back in. Your voice isn’t strong enough for this. “Tanuma, would--do you think you could cut my hair?” Your face burns, hotter than Touko’s fussing, hotter than your tears.

“Ehh,” he laughs, moving out of your space, “Do I look like I know anything about that?”

You laugh too: you have to. “No, you really don't.”


End file.
